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Focus on Kabul orphanage

[Afghanistan] Kabul orphans still await more assistance.
David Swanson/IRIN
Conditions at the orphanage are overcrowded and unhealthy
As winter fast approaches, some two thousand orphans in the Afghan capital Kabul's only state-run orphanage still await much needed assistance. While conditions have eased somewhat since the demise of the Taliban regime last year, the number of children has increased almost twofold. "We have 2,000 children now. Maybe next year we’ll have 4,000," orphanage director, Alhaj Habib Sameem told IRIN. If his warning holds true, it’s a dangerous trend demanding careful consideration and action by aid agencies and the government alike. With very few resources, the orphanage can ill afford to allow its population to expand, but instead must work to reform its current state of operations. "Many of these children have come from outside Kabul and beyond. Now we are accepting only the most serious cases," Sameem claimed. Located in a dusty compound in the north of the city, the 20-year-old Tahir Maskan orphanage has long proven a challenge for the aid community. Agencies have come and gone, unsure how to handle the multiple and often complicated problems of poor hygiene, lack of sanitation and inadequate nutrition that have plagued the facility for years. Even today the orphanage’s sewerage system remains blocked, despite numerous pledges by various aid agencies and NGOs over the years to resolve the matter. As children play in the afternoon sun, the stench of human excrement permeates the air. "The septic system is a mess. There really isn’t any place for the waste water to go," Louise Amber, programme manager for the British NGO Children in Crisis (CIC) told IRIN. Although conditions were dirty and overcrowded, in many ways there was less activity now than there was during the Taliban, she maintained. But the problems of Tahir Maskan and its sister Allauddin facility go far beyond a blocked septic system, involving the very make up of the two institutions' population and administration. According to Sameem, ranging in age from three to 17 years, the vast majority of the children are boys, with only 200 girls registered. One in two children have neither a mother nor father, 40 percent have lost one parent, while the remaining 10 percent have parents either mentally or physically handicapped or in jail, he explained. However, aid workers disagree. One told IRIN in confidence that approximately 95 percent of the children were not genuine orphans at all, and had at least one parent alive. Asked to account for this, he explained as many parents were struggling to look after their families, they viewed the orphanage as a place where their children could have access to education, food and health care. "This is particularly true if the family has lost mothers and the fathers cannot cope with their children alone - or feel they can’t," he said. Moreover, often when widowed mothers remarry, the new fathers don’t want the children from the previous relationship so they were passed on, he added. Another area of concern is the sheer size of the staff team at the orphanage. Estimated at 400, most of whom work in administration, aid agencies are bemused how so many people could possibly be employed in a government-run facility with few resources. "There is an overcrowding of children, but there is also an overcrowding of staff," Amber said. Defending the move, Sameem remarked: "Our 400 staff are working in shifts - that’s why." Equally disturbing was a decision by the World Food Programme (WFP) earlier this year to stop providing much needed food assistance to the orphanage after monitors determined some of the food was actually going to families of staff members instead. "We couldn’t renew this agreement in light of what they were doing," WFP spokesman, Alejandro Chicheri told IRIN. "These people could also be in need, but that was not the purpose of the distribution," he explained.
[Afghanistan] Kabul Orphans face squalor and disease.
The orphanage has yet to receive the attention it needs
According to Sameem, the lentils, which he described as rotten, were only given to staff member families when the children complained of stomach aches after eating it, a claim to which Alejandro answered: "We never received a letter saying the food was no good. Had we done so, we would have immediately taken action." Throughout the wrangling, however, it is the children who suffer. As the orphanage expands beyond its capacity, agencies and NGOs are increasingly reluctant to becoming involved. Just last week, a report by the Associated Press (AP) said interest in the orphanage was waning. Most of the aid workers were gone, while the number of children was on the increase. The report said each day, desperate parents or other relatives try to leave more children outside the building, despite the fact there is no heat in the dormitories, and in some rooms conditions were even worse than a year ago. "Thin mattresses lie on the floor to accommodate the increasing number of children, who share dirty blankets and wrap themselves in ragged layers against the chill," it explained. One of the more promising aspects of the orphanage - the school - is also suffering. Excluding the pre-school, approximately 1,650 students, following the national curriculum of the Afghan Ministry of Education, receive 4.5 hours of classes a day, including reading, writing, maths, Dari (the national language), biology and history. However, resources are again in short supply and classes average 65 students per room. "We need books and paper supplies, as well as tables and chairs," school principal, Habib Hamidullah told IRIN. "All paperwork is done by hand by staff. A photocopier would be well received," he suggested. But such assistance does not appear forthcoming as few people are interested in investing in what many see as the institutionalisation of children. Moreover, if the number of children was consistently going to increase unchecked, what work was being done - however meaningful - could quickly become obsolete, Amber explained. It was not sustainable to maintain an institution with 2,000 children - particularly when the majority of them had one or two family members, she said. "Shouldn't we be looking at alternatives that these children can remain in their family homes and local community?" she asked. Emphasising the importance of the family in Afghanistan, in 1998/1999, CIC ran a successful reunification programme for 347 orphans until a change in management halted the process. In an effort to jump start that effort today, the group has developed a proposal to reunite as many children as possible currently residing in the Alauddin and Tahia Maskan orphanages with their immediate family using a team of social workers to be recruited and trained from the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs. Under the scheme, a family reunification and family support model would be developed and implemented in order to ensure that reunified children were not placed at risk and that children and families received the support they needed during the reunification process over a two-year period - ensuring full integration and the successful rebuilding of family relationships. Furthermore, an appropriate support package would be offered to those children and families in order to offset the immediate economic burden of accepting the child back into the family. Liaison would also take place with appropriate agencies for the integration of children and their families into existing support programmes that include employment and educational opportunities. According to a project summary, where families could not be traced or reunified, appropriate foster care would be sought. This might involve family units with house mothers, or supervised independent living for older adolescents. "This will also entail the support of management change within the current orphanage structure to administer such developments," it said. A second phase of the project would be to convert the orphanages into centres of learning like a day care centre whereby children could attend for education, feeding and health care but reside elsewhere. But how such an endeavour would be received by the current administration is difficult to gauge at this point. There is no apparent plan or co-ordination of the current assistance given to the orphanage by the different agencies. Moreover, there is no long-term plan regarding the management and maintenance of the facility. Instead, the director requests support on a hand-to-mouth basis without prioritising needs or having to justify them. "We have a shortage of money, food and material," Sameem said, adding accommodation, blankets, beds, health facilities and transport were all in short supply. Observers agree that in the long-term interest of the children, there is a pressing need for reform at Tahir Maskan, but in the context of revamping the entire social welfare system in the country. "This is the challenge the government and donor community must now meet," Amber said.

This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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